1. Technical Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to multimedia systems and more particularly to audio video processing.
2. Description of Related Art
As is known, an entertainment system may range from a simple system (e.g., a television, a cable or satellite set top box, a DVD player and a few speakers) costing a few hundred dollars to an extravagant system (e.g., multiple projectors, multiple screens, multiple receivers, surround sound speakers in numerous rooms, computer control systems, etc.) costing in excessive of one-hundred thousand dollars. In most entertainment systems, the components of the system (e.g., the television, the receiver, etc.) are hard-wired into the system.
Recent advances in wireless local area networking, however, are providing a cost effective and efficient mechanism for replacing some of the hard-wire connections in an entertainment system. For example, streaming audio/video may be provided over a wireless communication path from an audio/video source (e.g., a set top box) to an audio/video destination (e.g., a television). In this example, the audio/video source and destination each include a wireless transceiver to facilitate the wireless communication. In addition, the television also includes video processing and audio processing to render the audio component of the streaming audio/video audible and to render the video component of the streaming audio/video visible.
An issue arises with the use of a wireless communication path, or for that matter a hard-wired communication path, when the audio component is provided for audio processing over a different communication path than the video component. For example, an entertainment system may include a hard-wired speaker system coupled to an A/V (audio/video) receiver of the system and a video monitor that is coupled to the A/V receiver via a wireless communication path. In this situation, synchronization may be off between the rendered audio via one path and the rendered video via another path, which is generally referred to as “lip sync”. Lip sync issues arise due to processing time differences between the audio path and the video path.
One approach to resolve the lip sync issue is to provide a user tunable audio delay, which the user of the system manually adjusts to sync the video he or she is viewing with the audible sounds he or she is hearing. While such an approach reduces lip sync issues, it does not appeal to many customers. Further, if the processing delays of one or both of the communication paths change, the user must manually adjust the audio delay.
Therefore, a need exists for a more user friendly method and/or apparatus for synchronizing of audio and video in a multiple path system.